


thoughts from the tourist

by ApatheticRobots



Series: the fundamentals of conscious existence [2]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crack Treated Seriously, Crossover, Established Relationship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Injury Recovery, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor Violence, Platonic Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-17 14:29:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28726629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApatheticRobots/pseuds/ApatheticRobots
Summary: A comprehensive guide on why messing with strange Cybertronian relics is only beneficial if you get lucky.(Or; Starscream learns that sometimes running away from your problems is okay.)
Relationships: Megatron & Starscream (Transformers), Starscream & Starscream (Transformers), Starscream & Wheeljack (Transformers), Starscream/Wheeljack (Transformers)
Series: the fundamentals of conscious existence [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2022745
Comments: 17
Kudos: 101





	thoughts from the tourist

**Author's Note:**

> oh my god this turned out SO much longer than i expected it to. i am so sorry  
> this is a sequel to the last idw/tfp starjack fic i did (the first part of the series), and while *technically* i guess you could read this on its own, theres a good few parts that wont make much sense without the context of the first part.
> 
> title is from "Tourist" by Jon Cozart. 
> 
> if this needs any other tags besides the ones i added please tell me im.. Bad At Tagging Things
> 
> also yes i KNOW trying to tell an entire story where two characters have the same name is Hell when figuring out when to use pronouns and descriptors and shit. i KNOW i overuse this style of summary. i KNOW i get kind repetitive in my writing sometimes. but its my comfort franchise and i get to choose how shitty the work i create for it is.

Maybe, Starscream was starting to realize, just maybe, he shouldn’t have been messing with the strange artifact that he had no idea what it did. Especially not while he was severely lacking in both allies and fuel and a t-cog. But hey, it  _ could _ have been something helpful. Something that… well, did any number of things. Reset his frame back to factory standards and fixed him up. Gave him the power to kill mechs with his mind. Those relics did all sorts of weird things.

But no. It did not give him his t-cog back or give him any kind of awesome power. Instead it just made a weird noise, flashed a bright light in his optics, and the next thing he knew he was waking up on his back in a completely unfamiliar location.

“What,” said a voice, “the fuck.”

The curse stuck out to him, because that was earth-centric, right? He swore he’d heard it there while perusing the radio waves during one patrol flight or another. Which meant he was still on Earth. Even if the ceiling was tall enough that even Megatron could have stood up straight with room to spare, and buildings of that size weren’t exactly plentiful on the organic planet where they never got taller than a couple meters. And even if it…  _ kind of _ looked Cybertronian in origin. Though there was still something fundamentally wrong about it. Like the light wasn’t hitting it quite right. It gave Starscream a headache.

Oh, wait, someone had said something, hadn’t they? With a considerable amount of effort, he braced his servos on the floor and shoved himself up, squinting against the spots burnt into his optics from the flash to try and get a look at the speaker.

The first thing he focused on was the little red sigil painted on a white chassis and  _ oh scrap that was an Autobot-- _

  
He scrambled back, plating scraping against the floor, until his wings hit a wall, at which point he held his servos up in surrender and squeezed his optics shut. “Don’t shoot!” He yelped, mentally berating himself for sounding so pathetic but at the same time knowing it was probably the only way he was gonna get out of this alive. “I’ll do whatever you’d like, don’t kill me!”

Silence from the other mech. Then a rough sigh. “Thought I was done with this scrap,” he muttered, and walked close enough that Starscream could sense the barest brush of his field before he stopped. There was a slight creak of metal and a low wheeze. “Gettin’ too old for this. Put your hands down, I’m not gonna hurt you.”

See, they always  _ said _ that, and then they went and hurt him anyways. Regardless, he slowly let his servos fall, blinking at the mech crouched in front of him.

...The oddly familiar mech, actually.

“Wh--”

“I’m gonna go out on a limb here an’ say you know me. Or, a version of me. Right?”

_ Wheeljack _ , his processor provided. Hadn’t he had this mech chained up a couple weeks ago? “Y-- Maybe,” he amended. “What do you mean by a  _ version _ of you?”

The Wheeljack who maybe wasn’t the Wheeljack he’d intercepted and briefly held prisoner before he escaped sighed again, shoving himself to his pedes, and muttered something about being “sick of this scrap” as he trundled over to a table that had been knocked on its side by something. With a grunt of effort he righted it, dusted it off, and hauled himself up to sit on it.

“What happened ‘fore you woke up here?” he asked, giving Starscream a tired look. (Probably, anyways, it was hard to tell with the mask.)

How honest should he be? Even if this somehow wasn’t the Wheeljack who wouldn’t hesitate to kill him, this mech was still an Autobot, and the Decepticon symbol on Starscream’s own chest wasn’t exactly easy to miss. So there was still a very good chance of him being shot. 

But… well, he hadn’t been shot  _ yet. _

“I found a device,” he said carefully, “and was… testing its purpose. There was some sort of malfunction, and I woke up here.” There. Succinct enough to get across what had happened, vague enough to not incriminate himself in any way. Even though he  _ supposed _ there was nothing wrong with what he’d been doing, the Autobots didn’t own the relics after all, most folks didn’t need much of an excuse to get mad at him.

Wheeljack just squinted at him for a moment, then covered his optics with one servo and sighed. “Okay,” he said. “Get up. Need to do a medical scan.”

“Wait, do you know what’s going on?”

“Unfortunately.” He leveled a Look™ at Starscream. “Congratulations. You’ve managed to get yourself transported to an alternate dimension. You’re lucky you ended up with me, I’m about the only guy who knows what it’s like. Now c’mon, let’s just get this over with ‘fore I gotta make up excuses about you.”

Scrambling to his pedes and following after Wheeljack as he left the room, Starscream found that this was probably the most “out of his element” that he’d been in a while. 

Which, considering how the past few weeks had gone, was saying something.

Wheeljack didn’t pay Starscream any mind as they walked. He did notice, though, when Starscream froze as they passed by a window, and when he went over and stood in front of it with an awed look on his face.

“It’s Cybertron,” Starscream murmured, looking out over the landscape that was both so familiar and so  _ not _ at the same time. “This-- It’s  _ alive. _ ” It was prospering. Which meant… the war was over? Wheeljack wasn’t in chains, so the Decepticons didn’t win, but he spotted mechs with flight alts passing through skyscrapers and pulling out of transformations to greet others on the streets below. So the Autobots couldn’t have won either. What  _ was _ this??

Wheeljack came to stand next to him. When he spoke, his voice was quiet; “I take it the one you know isn’t?”

Mutely, Starscream shook his head.

“Thought so.” Silence for a few moments, then; “You’re Starscream, right?”

He jerked, then looked away from the skyline and over at the mech standing beside him. “How did you know that??”

“Lucky guess. Apparently they were right; you are less colorful.” With literally no explanation to what exactly that meant, Wheeljack turned and started walking again, clearly expecting Starscream to follow. Which… he did. He didn’t want to be left alone for some other, less accommodating Autobot to run across him and decide to just shoot him. 

The hallway took them down a set of stairs and into another hallway, around a corner, and to a door that Wheeljack knocked loudly on and only entered after a few moments with no response. Starscream tried not to let himself get nervous at the beep of the door locking behind them.

It was very clearly a medical bay. More advanced than anything they had on the  _ Nemesis. _ He’d almost forgotten what it was like having adequate medical care.

So long as Wheeljack had experience with this kind of thing.

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Starscream asked, tone wary as he watched Wheeljack fiddle with the various machines and tools littered around the medbay. He’d found a cable somewhere and was working on connecting it to the machine. Diagnostic cable, probably. He wasn’t necessarily opposed to receiving medical attention from someone without certification (it wasn’t like Knock Out had ever graduated), but he also didn’t want to end up in a worse state than he already was.

Wheeljack shrugged. “I’m a scientist. Done enough work before and after the war t’ know my way around a mech. Had to fix up myself on multiple occasions.”  _ After _ the war, so his assumption about its conclusion had been right. “Might not be much use during a spark transfer but I can run a diagnostic just fine. Port, please.”

With only mild hesitation he sent the command to open the medical port on his side (thankfully  _ that  _ didn’t require a t-cog), and Wheeljack leaned over and plugged him in with little fanfare. The scan was as unnoticeable as ever. 

Wheeljack was silent as he looked over the results. Every so often there was something that made his optics narrow, or his digits twitch, but with the majority of his face covered, it was hard to tell exactly what he was feeling. Starscream wasn’t sure if he would’ve preferred to be able to see just how bad the results were by the other mech’s expression.

A few minutes into it Wheeljack read over something, froze, then seemed to do a double take as he paused the diagnostic and scrolled back to reread what the diagnostic had just reported.

“What?” Starscream asked sharply at the other mech’s silence. “What’s wrong?”

A few more moments of silence, then; “Do you… not have a t-cog?” Wheeljack’s voice was quiet, slightly horrified, and made Starscream’s nearly empty tanks twist. It was dangerously close to pity, what he was hearing, and he didn’t like it.

“It’s fine!” He snapped, tugging on the cable and stifling a wince as he pulled it out without properly disengaging it and caused a slew of errors across his HUD. “Stop-- It’s  _ fine, _ I’m handling it. Stop looking at me like that.” Like he was actually  _ worried _ or something. Starscream shoved himself to his pedes and started backing away. He knew the door was locked, but there was a window in the medbay, and his thrusters didn’t need a t-cog to work. He’d probably still crash, but he’d at least be out and away from the look in Wheeljack’s optics. The  _ pity. _

Wheeljack held his servos up palms out, a placating gesture, and took a careful step in Starscream’s direction. “Hey, it’s okay,” he said, slowly and calmly. Like he was trying to comfort a scared sparkling. “I’m not going to hurt you. I promise. I just want to help.”

Lies. It had to be lies. There was no way he was actually just  _ that _ magnanimous. 

Keeping his optics on Wheeljack to watch for an attack meant he wasn’t looking where he was going as he backed away, and when his heel caught on the edge of a rolling cart he lost his balance and fell on his aft in an ungraceful display of squawking and flailing limbs. The cart was knocked over as well, sending its contents flying, and one of the tools that had been sitting on top cut a sizable gash in the plating of Starscream’s arm as it fell. He hissed and grabbed at the wound. He was already low on fuel, losing any more wouldn’t be very helpful.

In the moments following him and the cart clattering to the floor, the only sound was his harsh venting, and the anxious thrumming of his engine. Wheeljack, once more crouched before him a few paces away, was completely silent. He was still holding his servos up like a gesture of surrender. 

“Starscream,” he said, low and soft. “It’s okay. I won’t hurt you. Please let me help.”

He couldn’t believe him. He couldn’t risk it. Even if Wheeljack’s optics looked kind and he wasn’t holding a weapon and he was still keeping his distance.  _ No one _ just wanted to “help” Starscream. Not even here, on this weird Cybertron where everything was different.

His HUD gave him a cheerful error that his fuel levels were lower than was able to keep his main processor functioning and his systems promptly began to go into stasis to conserve what little fuel he had left. His last sensation before the world faded around him was a gentle pair of arms catching him and stopping him from braining himself on the edge of the cart.

-

Starscream booted up slowly, component by component rather than all at once. First his internal sensors, then one by one his external sensors started flickering online. Olfactory, giving him the unfortunately familiar smell of antiseptic that came standard with most medbays. (Emphasis on  _ most, _ some of the ones they’d been in the dredges of the war hadn’t been the cleanest of places.) EM sensors, letting him know that there were only two other mechs in the room besides himself. Auditory came on in flickering bursts, and he caught bits and pieces of the hushed conversation going on a few paces away.

“--off the frame specs and the color of his--”

“--underfueled. Pretty sure it was that bad when he got here. Also, missing his--”

“--barely any evidence of an injury."

Another voice, one he didn’t recognize; "So, what, it just--"

“--who knew what they were doing. Judging by the--”

“--didn't have the materials when I was there--”

“--sort of subtle punishment isn't something he would--”

A click as his audials reset and the voices disappeared for a moment before coming back stronger, lacking the flickering static they’d had over them before. 

“So if it wasn't the Autobots, and wasn't the Decepticons…”

“I don’t know who else it could’ve-- Scrap, thought we’d have more time.” Wheeljack. That was Wheeljack’s voice. The Wheeljack who wasn’t the Wheeljack he’d captured and tortured prior. The Wheeljack who’d said he wanted to help him. 

“Don’t tell me he’s waking up  _ already, _ ” said that voice he didn’t recognize again. Immediately his half-awake systems jumped to alertness, which they probably shouldn’t have done, because everything went kind of hazy for a second and a high-pitched beeping kicked up. “Oh, dear, I don’t think that should be happening.”

“Shut up for a second!” An offended scoff followed by quick pedesteps, and a gentle servo on Starscream’s chassis. “It’s okay,” Wheeljack said, in that same soft voice he’d been using earlier. “He’s safe. You’re safe, too, everything’s okay.”

He didn’t-- He couldn’t believe that, he couldn’t let his guard down. Everything here seemed far too  _ good. _ It didn’t feel real. He found enough strength to shove the servo on his chest away, pushing himself up despite his optics still being offline. There was a muffled curse as he lashed out with his claws. Mostly on instinct than with any real intent to hurt.

“It’s-- Starscream, stop, you’re safe, don’t--”

His pede caught on something and he dropped like a stone, bringing a heavy weight and some loud clattering with him. Those arms that he remembered catching him earlier wrapped around his back, and he flailed against the hold.

“Don’t  _ grab him _ like that, you’re only going to make him freak out  _ more. _ ”

“I really didn’t ask for your input, y’know.”

Okay, not being able to see was terrible. Barrelling through all the reboot sequences still trying to run in the background, he forced his optics online, squinting against the sudden brightness.

Once the light rush finally cleared and he was able to see what was going on, it still took him a second to register the scene. He was in the same medbay as before, and he  _ had _ been on the same berth. But then he tried to get up and failed, and ended up not only knocking over that same cart he’d knocked over before, but dragging Wheeljack down as he went. Wheeljack, currently on his knees in front of Starscream, arms hovering loosely near his waist and panic in his optics. And standing behind him, leaning over and peering at Starscream with a leery expression, stood a mech he didn’t recognize. A flier, unless the wings on his back were just for show. 

“Are you going to stop flailing around and trying to claw Wheeljack’s optics out, or do we need to restrain you?”

He knew it. They  _ were _ out to get him. But then Wheeljack looked back at the strange mech, brow furrowed. “Don’t pick on him like that, he’d unsettled enough as it is.” He looked back to Starscream. “We aren’t actually goin’ to restrain you. We wouldn’t do that. It’s alright.”

Starscream jerked his chin at the strange flier. “Who is that?”

Wheeljack looked at him for a moment, then looked back at the strange mech, and after the mech simply shrugged he looked back to Starscream.

“Um,” he said. “Well.”

“Don’t be cagey.”

“I’m not bein’ cagey. How would  _ you _ go about this??”

“Do you really want me to answer that?”

“No. Just… be quiet for a second.” Wheeljack leaned back, setting his servos on his thighs. “Um, Starscream. Meet… Starscream.”

What.

He echoed his thoughts; “What.”

“That was so dull.”

“You’re not seriously judgin’ my panache, are you?”

“Of course I am.”

Starscream was just staring at the mech who… supposedly had the same designation as him. That wasn’t  _ too _ weird, right? Plenty of mechs were named the same thing, usually they settled it with either a healthy debate, a fight for dominance, or one of them just conceding and changing it. So this wasn’t  _ that _ weird.

Right?

“So, um, don’t freak out?” Wheeljack said, which usually preceded things that were likely to make him freak out. “This is an alternate universe. I’m the alternate version of Wheeljack, and this is the alternate version of Starscream. I think whatever device you mentioned you were messing with sent you… here.” He was fidgeting with his servos, carefully watching Starscream as though waiting for a reaction.

Well, he was sorely out of luck, because Starscream wasn’t doing much reacting beyond staring at him in silence.

“Oh, dear, you’ve broken him.”

“Shut  _ up.” _

“No.” Wheeljack was waved out of the way, the scientist’s protest cut off with a firm glare as the… alternate version of himself crouched down in front of him. He snapped his digits in front of Starscream’s optics a couple times. “Are you with us?”

  
“I--” Starscream winced at the way his voice broke, clearing his vocalizer. “How do I get back? I want to go home.”

The other Starscream (this was already weird) gave him a pitying look.

“Well, uh,” Wheeljack glanced at his counterpart, and his counterpart looked over at the scientist. Then jerked his head to the side in some kind of prompt. “That… That’s easier said than done.”

He narrowed his optics. “What does  _ that _ mean?”

“It means you can’t go home,” his counterpart said. “Not just yet, anyways. We simply haven’t the materials to build that kind of high-tech device here right now. Messing with the space-time continuum is no small matter, you see. Using inferior parts could mean the destruction of both our world and the world you’re trying to contact.” That seemed… disappointingly sound. “We can get them, of course, it’s just going to take a little while.”

Starscream leveled a glare at his counterpart. His counterpart simply stared right back. There wasn’t the slightest flicker of anything in his expression that might betray ulterior motives. Now, Starscream was not in any way, shape, or form, the trusting sort. No matter how much these mechs might have been honest about wanting to help him he still wasn’t about to go and just  _ trust _ them.

But… he didn’t exactly know enough to refute what they were saying. This kind of science was well beyond anything he’d studied. And since these two mechs (supposedly) had prior experience… he could believe their reasoning.

“So,” he said, still on guard because  _ not _ being on guard right now would be foolish, “what am I to do in the meantime? Insert myself into society and do my level best to pretend I belong here?”

“Er, maybe that’s not a great idea,” Wheeljack said. He abruptly got to his pedes. “Neither of you move. Give me a klik.” He darted from the room. Starscream’s counterpart stared after him with a look Starscream couldn’t quite place. He was smiling, and almost looked annoyed, but there was something… terribly fond about it.

It was  _ weird. _ Both of these mechs were really, really weird.

“Isn’t that just like him. Running out on a guest. Terribly rude,” he said, but there was no actual heat in his tone. He glanced over at Starscream, where he was currently working to haul himself up with a servo gripping the berth he was sat against. “I’d offer you help up, but supposedly if we make contact the universe could implode.”

Starscream paused. “What?”

“Just a theory Wheeljack has. Identical atoms from differing dimensions aren’t really supposed to collide. We’ve never been able to test it, obviously, but in cases like this it’s often best to assume the worst and just stay well away from any possible negative consequences.”

He didn’t have much of a chance to try and get his counterpart to maybe elaborate on that just a little bit more, as the door opened and Wheeljack came rushing back in. “Sorry,” he said. “Wanted to get these.” Carefully clutched in one servo were two slim bands made from some kind of metal, and held in the other servo was a cube of something pink. “Put this on,” he said, dropping one of the bands into Starscream’s servo, then set the cube down on the berth above him. “Then drink that.” 

“What is this?” Starscream asked warily, holding up the band to examine it critically under the harsh medbay lighting.

“Star told’ja about the whole ‘destroying the universe’ thing, right? It’s a prototype, made from an experimental alloy, and should hopefully stop that from happening. Don’t need to get into the nitty-gritty details but it basically makes you paradox proof. I wouldn’t try time travel, but it should make sure you two don’t accidentally destroy the multiverse by bumping wings.” He handed the other band over to Starscream’s counterpart, who slipped it on without a second thought.

Well… if the other him was so trusting, it probably wasn’t that harmful. He tightened the band around one wrist, careful to leave it loose enough that he still had full range of movement. It didn’t make him feel any different.  _ Probably _ safe. 

Abruptly, a servo latched around his arm and hauled him upright. 

“Oh, what do you know,” his counterpart said, letting him go with a little pat to his shoulder, “it  _ does _ work. You’re a genius, Wheeljack.”

Wheeljack stood frozen where he’d been before, staring at the two of them for a moment, then sighed and put his head in his servos. “You’re gonna give me a spark-attack one of these days,” he muttered. “What if it  _ hadn’t _ worked?”

“Well, it did, so there’s no need to worry.” He picked up the cube and pushed it into Starscream’s servos. “Do drink that, you need the fuel.”

Starscream blinked at the cube. The liquid inside was glowing a soft pink.  _ Fuel, _ his counterpart said. “This is-- energon??” He sputtered. “But-- it’s the wrong color!” Energon was  _ blue, _ everyone knew that. Was this some kind of medical grade? What additives were in it?? Was it poisoned???

“Y’know, I thought the same thing when I ended up in your dimension,” Wheeljack mused. “It’s energon. Just normal, plain old midgrade. I can get you a tester if you need proof.”

He leered at the cube for a moment. “No,” he said, “it’s fine.” And promptly downed half of it in one go. There was a concerned noise from Wheeljack, and his counterpart just looked mildly impressed.

It… tasted fine. Pretty bland, actually. He’d have put some iron or something in it. 

He handed the empty cube over once he’d finished, and Wheeljack tossed it in the general direction of the medbay’s sink, where it hit the counter with a clatter and was promptly forgotten.

“So,” Wheeljack said. “Feeling any better?”

“I… suppose.” He glanced down at where he’d scraped his arm earlier. The gash had been welded shut, and the area cleaned. Doubtful he could’ve done a better job himself. “...Thank you,” he said, hoping there wasn’t as much bite in his tone as it sounded to his audials. He really shouldn’t be taking free medical care for granted. No matter how many unspoken ultimatums these two might’ve had. 

He looked at his… counterpart... again. He doubted that was ever not going to be weird. There were too many differences for him to be disturbed, a fact he was grateful for, but at the same time the few similarities he  _ did _ notice made an uneasy feeling settle in his tanks.

Especially given the way his counterpart kept looking at him. It was far too close to pitying for Starscream’s taste.

And he didn’t like the way the mech held himself. Back struts straight, helm kept high, wings wide and tall. It was all the body language of a mech who believed himself better than everyone else around him. Sheer, unbridled confidence. And it would’ve been less abhorrent if he was anyone else. Still annoying, because how  _ dare _ someone assume they were better than him, but the fact that it was technically  _ himself _ acting like that… Not only was it kind of confusing thinking about it, but it made that uneasy feeling all the worse.

“I should be going,” his counterpart said with a sigh. “An emperor’s work never ends, after all.” He moved to Wheeljack’s side, leaning over to kiss the side of the scientist’s faceplate, much to Starscream’s bewildered shock. “Don’t hesitate to call me if you need help with getting our  _ guest _ settled, dear.” And he turned and swept from the room with all the grace of someone who held all the power and  _ knew it. _

Wheeljack stared after him for a moment, then glanced back at Starscream. Then-- “Oh, damnit, he did that on purpose. Are you okay?”

He probably asked because Starscream was looking at him like he’d sprouted a second head and it had started reciting the Covenant of Primus. Starscream sputtered for a moment, and after several failures in getting his vocalizer to cooperate, he just gestured vaguely at the door his counterpart had just left through.

“Ah. Yeah, um,” Wheeljack laughed awkwardly, hunching his shoulders and messing with his servos. “We’re, uh, conjunxes.” Which was apparently not enough of a bombshell to drop, because a moment later he added; “And he’s in charge of Cybertron. Like, the whole thing.”

Once Starscream finished being completely thrown off guard, he moved right past admiration and directly onto an awful mix of embarrassed anger. 

How come  _ this _ version of him was able to achieve so much? Why did  _ this _ Starscream get to be so well-off? A conjunx who loved him dearly, a position of power that actually meant something. Freedom from the war that had entrenched his version of Cybertron for millennia. What made him so much more deserving? What made him so much  _ better? _

“Hey,” said a soft voice, accompanied by an equally gentle servo on his shoulder. “Are you alright? Your wings are shaking.” And of course he knew what that meant, being  _ conjunxed to a flier and all. _

“I’m  _ fine,” _ Starscream snapped, jerking away from the contact. “You-- why are you being so  _ nice  _ to me??”

Wheeljack stared at him for a moment, concern lighting his optics. Then he shrugged. “Why not?” he said, simply as anything.

“Because it’s--” A huff. Why didn’t he  _ get it? _ It was terrible. As much as feeling out of place was inevitable, given his situation, Wheeljack failing to respond to his jabs the way Starscream expected just made him feel even  _ more _ isolated. “Has peacetime really made you so soft? Mechs aren’t  _ nice _ to one another just  _ because. _ There has to be a reason. You have to want something in return.” He still didn’t look like he was getting it. Starscream huffed again. “You’re very convincing, but you can’t honestly expect me to believe you’re simply doing this out of the goodness of your spark.”

The scientist shrugged again, reaching up to kind of idly rub at the back of his helm. “I mean… I kinda am? Like, sure, it’s a little bit ‘cause I’m just curious about how you work,” he said, and Starscream felt a flicker of vindication, but continued before he could call his bluff, “but it’s also ‘cause I know what it’s like. Being dragged into a whole new place where things aren’t the way you know ‘em.” 

Starscream looked at him with wide optics.

“It’s true.” He glanced away, optics crinkling in what Starscream assumed to be his version of a smile. “Little while ago, I was in your pedes. A device I was workin’ on malfunctioned and left me stranded in another dimension.  _ Your _ dimension, matter a’ fact. So I know how it is.”

“...I see.” That was a little bit of a comfort, he supposed, that he wasn’t the only mech this had ever happened to. That there was another out there who understood his predicament.

And it was enough of a justifiable explanation that his processor stopped screaming about trickery and ulterior motives. 

“Yeah.” Wheeljack sighed, then stood up straight and shook his head a bit. “Anyway. I’ll bet you’re probably tired of sitting around here. Why don’t we get you settled with somewhere to recharge, huh?” He gestured for Starscream to follow, then headed off towards the door. Without even pausing to consider, Starscream hurried after him. 

“Where are we going?”

“Well, I mean,” Wheeljack hummed, “there’s some guest rooms here, ones the delegates use when they come by and meetings run long, but I kinda figured you might not be keen on being left alone. There’s an extra room in our apartment.”

Another jolt in his spark as his processor jumped to figure out what the ulterior motives  _ here _ could be, but he waved them away before they could get very far. “That would be… more acceptable. I doubt being discovered by some wayward Autobot would have very good consequences.” He couldn’t help the shiver that ran down his struts at the idea. Sure, Wheeljack was nice, but who knew how much of an exception he was?

Wheeljack gave him a look. “The war’s over. They wouldn’t just attack you with no warning.”

Starscream bared his teeth, more as a reflexive gesture than any real threat. “Over it may be,” he said, still only halfway believing that, “some have evidently not forgotten it occurred.” The last part was said with a gesture at Wheeljack’s chest, where the Autobot symbol still sat proudly.

Moving an absent-minded servo to brush over the symbol, Wheeljack’s optics flicked to the Decepticon brand emblazoned on Starscream’s own chestplate.

“...Right,” he said, and that was the end of it. “I’ll hail us a transport to the apartment.”

-

He recharged for a solid day after being shown to the room that would be his, and neither Wheeljack nor his counterpart disturbed him. He was… grateful for it. Apparently the stress of  _ everything _ that had happened had worn him out. 

When he woke it was in a berth more comfortable than he’d had in millennia (even his own back on the  _ Nemesis _ had not been so nice) and feeling better rested than he could remember. 

Wheeljack and the other Starscream were talking quietly amongst themselves when he finally left his room. They went silent as soon as they saw him, but he couldn’t find it in himself to be all that suspicious, considering how good the rest of him felt. He gave them a muttered “good morning,” and received one in return, along with a cube of fuel pushed into his servos. The fuel was high-quality, and-- like everything else in this place was turning out to be-- of nicer make than anything he’d had recently.

Well-rested, fully fueled. If he’d known peacetime would be like  _ this _ he might’ve campaigned for it a little harder. Then again, there was a significantly low likelihood that peacetime in  _ his _ world would be like peacetime in this one. Especially considering his Megatron was an idiot.

...He wondered what this world’s was like.

He didn’t have time to ask, because as soon as he finished his fuel he was being ushered into a transport and seated across from his two escorts.

The pattern went a similar way as days passed. Wake up, refuel, go with Wheeljack and other Starscream to the tower, find some way to spend the day, refuel again, occupy himself some more, go back to the apartment with his escorts (though perhaps “caretakers” would’ve been more appropriate), refuel another time, do something for the evening, recharge, repeat.

He could… get used to such a life. He supposed.

There really wasn’t much for Starscream to do around the tower that served as Wheeljack’s and this Starscream’s place of work, and he couldn’t exactly just go wandering around the city to his spark’s content, so he spent most of the time he wasn’t recharging sitting around the lab while Wheeljack worked, or tucked up in the corner of his counterpart’s office with a datapad to distract him. He felt a bit like a sparkling being coddled, but with how much he didn’t know about this world, he had to admit he wasn’t much better off than one. And while he was under constant supervision, it wasn’t like he  _ couldn’t _ leave. On the sparse occasions he’d asked both mechs had happily offered to show him around. It was just…

Well, it was quite a task adjusting to being in a society that wasn’t bound by war. How many millenia had it been? Far too many. He couldn’t quite recall exactly what it was like. Not every shout was a threat, not every crash was a battle, and not every sudden movement was the start of an attack. He wasn’t  _ used _ to that. There had been quite a few close calls.

So it was just easier if he stayed inside, with one or both of the two mechs he knew to not mean him any harm. 

There was no shortage of little things to occupy his time, at least. There were innumerable datapads he’d never read and enough little experiments Wheeljack asked for his help on to fill a year’s worth of classes. He was pretty sure the two of them had more pressing responsibilities than keeping an optic on him, but they never complained. Or seemed too busy. Whichever was with him, the other would usually show up soon enough. 

...Was that what it was like, having a conjunx? Simply wanting to spend time with them  _ all the time? _ Starscream couldn’t imagine it. He hadn’t had a mech whose company he’d like that much in… well, it had been a while. 

He wasn’t paying attention to whatever Wheeljack was working on today. His counterpart didn’t seem to be paying much attention either. What drew  _ both _ of their gazes towards the scientist was the loud pop followed by a hiss, and moments later the machine in Wheeljack’s servos started spitting smoke and sparks. Wheeljack jerked his servo a bit too fast, and there was another hiss and the sparks stopped. The low whine that had been coming from it went quiet. If Starscream had to guess, there had been a malfunction and the power had died. 

"Primus--" Starscream heard the low rush of cooling fans turning on, followed by a loud " _ DAMNIT!"  _ and the crunch of metal as Wheeljack slammed a fist against the table. He wasn't sure whether the crunch was his servo crumpling or him denting the table's surface.

Regardless, and completely against his will, he flinched at the noise, wings falling low and optics going wide.

His counterpart frowned. After a second Wheeljack looked over at him, optics darkening. He stood suddenly, and Starscream completely failed to refrain from flinching at the movement. "I'm going for a walk," he said bluntly, trudging past Starscream and towards the door.

"Take as much time as you need," his counterpart called softly. As soon as Wheeljack had left, he looked to Starscream and patted the empty seat beside him. "Come sit."

After a moment of deliberation, Starscream complied.

His counterpart simply sat there for a moment, tapping his claws together. When he finally spoke, his voice was just as soft as before; "There are some things," he said, "that we have discovered are true no matter the universe one finds themselves in. The broadness of these concepts, which we call 'universal constants', varies. But I have discovered, after much research, that no matter the universe. No matter the time or place. Megatron is, unrepentantly, a complete piece of scrap." 

The energon in Starscream's lines ran cold. "I don't--"

"Please," his counterpart said dismissively, "don't take me for a fool. Don't take  _ us _ for a fool. You wear it all over your wings."

"You presume much."

"I presume very little. However, I make many educated guesses." He checked the thin band on his wrist, then looked over to make sure Starscream was still wearing his, and once he was sure they weren't about to destroy the time-space continuum, he reached over and set his servo over Starscream's. "I know what it is like," he whispered. "Probably better than anyone else in this world or another. I have been in your pedes, and I understand. But he can't reach you here. And even if he did, even if he somehow managed it, I am the leader of Cybertron and Wheeljack is in charge of our science division. The two of us together have plenty of resources at our disposal to protect you. I know it's hard to believe, but you're safe here. I promise."

He would not cry. He hadn’t cried in decades, he hadn’t even allowed himself the displeasure when his trine had died. He wouldn’t let something like  _ this _ finally break him down.

“I didn’t deserve what he did,” Starscream said, and his counterpart watched silently. “I didn’t. I don’t.” After a moment, he added; “You didn’t either.”

“Of course not.” His counterpart gave him a sharp grin, patting his servo once more before standing and puffing up his chest, flaring his wings wide. “We’re  _ Starscream, _ aren’t we? Better than him by leagues. And while it may never be  _ gone, _ ” he offered Starscream help up, and pulled him to his pedes once he took it, “it will get  _ better. _ For the both of us. And, for any Starscream out there we’ve yet to meet.”

He couldn’t help the slight bitter tone his next few words took (although he regretted it a moment later); “Seems like it’s gotten a great deal better for  _ you _ already.” Damn his lack of filter.

There was a brief flash of offense on his counterpart’s face, but it was gone just as quickly. “It has,” he said, nodding, “that’s true. I’m the Supreme Leader of the planet and I have a conjunx who loves me dearly. But all is not perfect. I have bad days. You’ve simply yet to be here for one.” He turned on a dime, heading towards the door. “Now, let’s go find Wheeljack, before he decides burying himself in guilt is an adequate response to what previously transpired.”

It was a diversion, and Starscream knew it, but he’d let it slide. He certainly wasn’t in any position to protest. So he followed his counterpart as he swept from the room and through the halls of… whatever building they were in. It seemed to be kind of a catchall; Wheeljack’s lab was here, but so was the medbay, and apparently his counterpart’s office. Or… one of his offices. Some of the things the two had said implied he had multiple. Which, yeah, okay, if Starscream was in charge of a planet (which… he supposed he was? No, wait, stop thinking about it) he’d probably make the most out of it as well.

They ended up finding Wheeljack on one of the many balconies intended for fliers to be able to take off and land. It was little things like that, accommodations for flight frames being an intrinsic part of the architecture rather than a later add-on for standards compliance, that were more proof to Starscream that the war was over and the Autobots hadn’t had a complete victory than any word from a mech could be. 

Wheeljack stood facing the city skyline, shoulders hunched and fans on low, servos gripping the safety railing to keep himself steady. He glanced back as the two walked out onto the balcony. “Hey,” he said, quiet and a little hoarse. “Sorry about that. Didn’t mean to get so mad.”

“It’s perfectly alright,” his counterpart said, a servo on the small of Starscream’s back guiding him to stand between him and Wheeljack at the balcony’s edge. “Feeling calmer now?”

“Yeah.” He glanced at Starscream, frown clear even without a visible mouth. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” he said, snappish though lacking any serious agitation. “It was nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

After a moment, Wheeljack’s servo settled on his shoulder. Primus, these mechs were awfully touchy, weren’t they? “You don’t gotta explain anything,” he said quietly. “I get it. Not as much as others might,” and his counterpart curled his digits a bit where they still rested against Starscream’s back, “but I get it. And I really am sorry for the way I was.”

Starscream rolled his optics. Ridiculous mech. “Stop apologizing so much. You didn’t mean anything by it, so it’s fine.”

“If you’re sure.”

Wheeljack fell silent, and neither he nor the other Starscream had any more to say, so instead they just stood quietly on the balcony for a while longer. Starscream spent the whole time trying very hard to pretend he wasn’t relaxing into the various points of contact where servos still rested on his frame. 

-

While Starscream was not the most…  _ socially adept _ of mechs, he’d spent quite a while teaching himself what the behaviors of various mechs meant. So he could recognize Wheeljack’s fidgeting for what it was; he had something to say, but he didn’t know how it would be received. Which could only mean it was something either a) possibly offensive or b) something in relation to a sensitive subject. Neither of which were things Starscream would respond pleasantly to. He was content to just let Wheeljack stew in silence for as long as it took him to find his words.

But the fidgeting was starting to get  _ really _ annoying.

“Alright,” he snapped, slamming his datapad down and making Wheeljack jump and look over at him with wide optics. “I can hear the gears in your head turning from here. Just say whatever’s got you in a tizzy already.”

Wheeljack winced. So he’d clearly been right. He rubbed at the back of his helm again, a gesture Starscream recognized by now as being a sort of anxious tic, and cleared his vocalizer. “I was just…” He trailed off. Then tried again. “I wasn’t sure about bringing it up again, ‘cause you kinda, uh, reacted badly when I brought it up before, but…” He sighed. “What happened to your t-cog?”

Starscream flinched on instinct, servo instantly moving to cover the space on his side where his plating had been pried apart and his internals rifled through. “It was…” He reset his vocalizer when it fizzled into static. “Stolen.”

There was a soft murmur of “Primus,” that had him wincing again. 

“By humans,” he continued, unable to stop the venom from slipping into his tone. “We were supposed to be  _ allies. _ But after the other t-cog they were able to acquire failed to be sufficient for their needs, they turned on me. Stunned me and tore me apart to take mine.” He was furious, but his wings were shaking with anxiety rather than rage as his processor replayed the memory. The bite of electricity bringing him to his knees, the flare of pain as his chassis was sliced apart, waking up aching and cold with a pervasive feeling of  _ emptiness _ inside him, the horror once he realized what had happened and what they had taken and that he was  _ trapped-- _

“Starscream!”

He didn’t realize his fans were screaming and his ventilations were going a mile a minute until Wheeljack’s alarmed call of his name snapped him back into the present moment. He gave a hoarse wheeze, digging his claws into the first available thing he could get them on. Which just so happened to be his own plating.

“Stop that,” Wheeljack admonished gently, and through a haze of memories from another place and another time he saw the scientist come over and take hold of his servo to stop him from hurting himself any further. “You’re okay. You’re safe here.” 

“I’m okay,” he repeated, vents still spitting hot air but no longer quite as overheated. “I’m safe here.” He gripped Wheeljack’s servo like a lifeline until his fans clicked off and he felt like he could think clearly again. “Thank you. Any-- Anyway. I managed to find someplace safe to stay, and I  _ did _ manage to get a replacement t-cog.” The less said about the clone incident the better. “But I… could not find a way to install it. I can do many things. But I cannot perform surgery on myself.”

“Course not,” Wheeljack said. “Wouldn’t expect you to.”

The scientist paused, and got that hesitant look in his optics again. Given the way this conversation was going, Starscream had a pretty good feeling what it might be.

Eventually he got over himself with no prompting from the Seeker and spoke; “We’re built different. But if you have a replacement… We have… resources,” he said. “Supplies. Good medics with plenty of spare time on their servos. If you want… We can get it fixed. But it’s up to you, don’t gotta feel pressured. If you don’t want it fixed that’s your business and I won’t push you.”

Starscream looked at him funny. “Why in the world wouldn’t I want it fixed?”

“Well.” He clasped his servos together. “Sometimes there’s… Personal reasons.” 

“...Personal reasons?” That was a fantastically vague explanation from the usually-wordy mech. He’d never seemed one for keeping things succinct in the time Starscream had known him. “Care to elaborate?”

Hesitantly, Wheeljack reached up and brushed his digits against his face mask. “Yeah, okay,” he said, “but don’t freak out.”

  
“Why would I--”

And then the mask slid to the side, and yeah okay he supposed the request was kind of warranted. He’d expected scarring at worst, or perhaps a simple personal distaste for having his face exposed. Protection from dangerous chemicals, with all the lab work he did. Maybe even that he simply didn’t have a proper mouth, rather a rudimentary intake, it wasn’t unheard of. But no. Instead of any of those things, he just so happened to be  _ missing the entire lower half of his jaw. _

Starscream, for the record, did not freak out. He would call it a brief and controlled moment of panic. He did not scream, or say something horribly offensive. Instead he just yelped once then clapped his servos over his mouth to stop himself from doing either of those previously mentioned things.

Despite the lack of a particularly outrageous reaction, Wheeljack still winced, and his mask slid back over his face. “I could get it fixed,” he said, and Starscream only now picked up on the odd buzz that went along with a mech speaking directly from their vocalizer without the filter of a mouth in the way, “but, I don’t know. I just never really wanted to. Didn’t feel right. Star asked a while back, if I wanted to. Said no. He didn’t push. So… I’m tryin’ not to push now.”

It… made sense. Not to Starscream, really, who when he had so little left still had an amount of confidence in his appearance (and would want anything that may be a detriment to that repaired immediately), but in the context of the kind of mech Wheeljack was. It made perfect sense.

“I see,” he said. “And I understand. But I do want my t-cog fixed. I feel--”  _ empty. Wrong. Like a part of me is missing, because it is. Like half the mech I was. Incomplete without it.  _ “--...tired. Of not being able to fly.” It was true, Seekers were built to fly and he hadn’t been able to in far too long, but that was not to say all the things he didn’t say were false.

“Okay. I’ll talk to some folks.” 

And that was that. Wheeljack dropped the topic, and didn’t bring it back up again, and Starscream kind of thought he might’ve forgotten they even had the conversation until a week later when he was relaxing by the bay window in his counterpart’s office and said mech sat bolt upright, immediately tucking his datapad away and getting to his pedes. “Come on,” he said, and Starscream instantly moved to follow as he hurried away. “Your medic’s arrived.”

“My what?” His counterpart gave him a pointed look, tilting his head down at Starscream’s frame without a word. “Oh. Right. That.”

They went through the halls of the tower, and while his counterpart paid no mind to the mechs they passed and the curious glances thrown their way, Starscream couldn’t help but hike his wings up defensively and cross his arms over his chassis to hide the Decepticon symbol there. He knew he was unlikely to be attacked, especially since the mech he was trailing after was the Supreme Leader of Cybertron. But countless years of always looking over his shoulder did not leave because he’d had a few nice weeks.

Starscream almost turned and ran in the other direction when he saw white and red plating in a terribly familiar shape standing with Wheeljack at the end of the hall. The logical part of his processor knew the mech standing there was an entirely different one than he knew.

But, well.

Who wouldn’t be a little on edge seeing the enemy medic standing there? Especially one with, reportedly, a sadistic streak that could rival Knock Out’s sometimes.

“So,” this universe’s version of Ratchet said, peering at Starscream. “This is him?”

“Yep. This is him.” Wheeljack gestured them over. Starscream froze for a moment, but his counterpart grabbed him by the arm and hauled him along, leaving him to stumble forward unless he wanted to be physically dragged the rest of the way. Apparently Wheeljack misinterpreted what Starscream’s anxious look meant, because he added; “Don’t worry, Ratch is the best I know. He’ll fix you up no problem.”

“Right,” Starscream said, but his wings kept twitching.

“I trust you can handle him from here,” his counterpart said to Wheeljack over his helm. He gave Ratchet a narrow-opticed look. “Ratchet.”

“...Starscream.”

With that, his counterpart turned and left. Starscream kind of wished he could follow. But instead Wheeljack set a servo on his back just under his wings and he was led into the room they stood outside.

A minute later and he found himself seated on a medical berth, several wires hooked into his chassis and Ratchet standing next to him and frowning at a datapad. “Missing t-cog, huh,” he muttered. “That’s a new one. Must’ve been a pretty clean loss if your spark and brain module are still running fine.” 

“Yes, no problems with  _ those, _ thankfully,” he muttered, although sometimes he wondered. He was functional, yes. But functional was just the prerequisite for everything else. 

“Yeah, shouldn’t be a problem.” He glanced at a readout of Starscream’s frame. Then stopped, frowned, and did a double take. (Funny, Wheeljack had done the same thing when looking at his scans after he’d first shown up.) “Although… this might.” He zoomed in on the empty cavity where Starscream’s t-cog should have been. “This isn’t… right. The shape here, it’s too big. And these aren’t the right connections.” He gave Starscream an incredulous look. “Are you sure you’ve got a Cybertronian frame there??”

Starscream bristled, but Wheeljack set a servo on his shoulder and he (regretfully) calmed. “It’s a different model,” he said through gritted teeth. “I have a t-cog that will work. You just need to install it. I assume even with the differences, you are capable of doing that? If you are as good a medic as Wheeljack claims?”

There was a wince from the scientist, and briefly he regretted his instinctually defensive speech habits, but Ratchet didn’t throw anything at him or up and leave. He just snorted and held out a servo to Starscream. “Of course I can install it. Hand it over.”

He did. With only mild griping for the medic to be careful with it.

“Lie down,” Ratchet said, flicking a switch to send an anesthetic program through one of the cables stuck in Starscream’s medical port. “You won’t feel a thing.”   
  


Far too many interactions with Knock Out saying the same thing and Starscream definitely feeling something made him want to voice his disbelief, but the program kicked in and his vision faded out. 

The last time he’d woken up after being forcefully knocked unconscious was… Okay, actually, it was after he’d gotten here and it had been kind of anxiety-inducing. But things were sorted and he was mildly okay after a few minutes. But the time before  _ that, _ he’d woken up to a nightmare. And even if he’d had a corrective “waking up” experience following it, that kind of thing still lingered.

So as soon as there was no longer a third-party program holding his processor in unconsciousness he jolted awake, limbs flailing as they failed to respond to his processor’s commands in time, completely disoriented.

“Oh, damnit, he’s up already--”

“He sure slept that off quick.” 

A pair of arms that were starting to become disconcertingly familiar settled around him, and he relaxed into what he recognized as Wheeljack’s hold. “Hey, easy,” the scientist said. “It’s okay. You’re in the medbay, you’re fine. Open your vents so you don’t overheat.” It was an easy enough command to follow, and Starscream did, wheezing slightly as he drew in chilly, antiseptic-scented air. 

“Congratulations,” Ratchet said from a few paces away, and Starscream looked over at him sharply. “You now have a functional t-cog… of sorts. Your frame accepted it so it must have been right.” He gave Starscream a warning look. “You can transform, but keep it to a minimum for the next week or so. Don’t go overdoing it and burning that thing out, unless you’ve got another one stuffed somewhere, ‘cause I’m not sure I could replicate it if I tried. Especially not without another one to base a copy off of.”

“Thanks, Ratchet,” Wheeljack said, still holding Starscream against his chest. “I owe you one. And thanks for coming all this way, I know it was a bit of a trip. How’s the Lost Light doing?”

“Yeah, yeah,” he waved a servo at the scientist. “Doing fine enough. Left First Aid in charge while I came back here, he’s shaping up to be quite the medic. Good kid, that mech. You ever get a chance to meet him?” 

“Can’t say I have.”

Starscream tuned out the conversation between the two, instead letting his processor wander. A quick self-diagnostic showed an affirmative return ping when he checked to make sure that he did actually have his t-cog and it was properly installed. A giddy rush ran through his lines at the familiar feeling, and his plating flexed involuntarily with the desire to finally transform and get some air under his wings.

“Make sure he doesn’t push it,” Ratchet said as Starscream blinked and returned to the present. “I don’t wanna have to come back in a week ‘cause he messed something up.”

“Will do, Ratch. Have a safe trip back.”

With a noncommittal sound, Ratchet left the room, and left him and Wheeljack alone.

“So,” Wheeljack said, tilting his head in what Starscream now recognized as his version of a grin, “want me to call Star down and the two of you can go on a flight?”

It was a tempting offer. Starscream’s wings gave a little flutter at the idea. But… Maybe he wanted to be smart about this for once in his life. Knowing what was at stake. “Not right now,” he said quietly. “I think I’d just like to go home and recharge.” He idly wondered when his room in their apartment had started being classified as “home” in his mind. 

Wheeljack paused, like he might have been about to try and convince him otherwise, but rather than putting a voice to his thoughts he just shrugged. “Fair enough. I’ll call a transport.”

He must have commed the other Starscream on their way there, because he was waiting with fuel when they arrived. Starscream took the offered cube and downed it without a second thought. Even the foreign color of the energon here had stopped seeming so strange. (He hadn’t asked Ratchet, hadn’t thought to, but he kind of wondered whether his lines ran with pink now. If all the fuel from his old universe had finally run its course and been replaced with the new stuff.) 

He didn’t stick around to chat long, finishing his fuel then taking his leave to head to his room a moment later. His counterpart gave him a concerned look, but didn’t try to stop him.

It took him mere seconds to fall into recharge as soon as he hit the berth.

-

In Starscream’s opinion, a dream did not have to be specific to be frightening. Sometimes the worst dreams were those incomprehensible amalgamations of a hundred different terrible things. Vague thoughts were often more terrifying, as they allowed one’s processor to fill in the blanks on its own. And those blanks were usually filled with more horrifying things than were there originally.

And when you had a mind like Starscream’s, with so many years of awful things and so much material to work with, vague dreams were the  _ worst. _

His processor could take all the worst bits and pieces of his history and mash them together and create some awful combination that targeted all his weakest points. His creative mind was his own worst enemy.

The nightmare was vague. Full of electricity and sickly violet light and pain from every sensitive part of his frame. Despite that, it still had him waking fitfully, sitting bolt upright with his vents heaving and the long-missed feeling of the plating of his arm pulling itself apart to prime his inbuilt weapons. He wasn’t aiming at anything, but even just having access to the rifle calmed his racing spark.

He got to his pedes and headed for the door, intent on getting a cube to refresh what energon he’d lost in his earlier stress, but quiet voices that got the slightest bit louder as he opened the door made him pause. 

“...about this?"

"I don't  _ know, _ okay? I'm not good at this like you are." Wheeljack's tone sounded bitter. "I don't lie for a living. I build things. I fix problems. All I know is that he clearly wasn't having the best time where he came from, and that staying here could make it better."

Were they… talking about him? 

Carefully, he leaned closer to the doorway, peering out at where Wheeljack and his counterpart were sitting and talking with lowered voices.

"And I'm not saying he won't agree with you," his counterpart said patiently, "but you can't keep lying. If I know him-- and I do-- the second he thinks there's some kind of plot going on that he isn't aware of, he's going to go on the defensive. He may never trust us again. I know you have the device built. You can never let anything lie. He might not recognize it for what it is but if he asks you're going to end up telling him and then he's going to know we could've sent him home anytime." 

The conversation faded to white noise in Starscream's audials. They had lied. They had  _ lied. _ Lied to  _ him. _ A memory was thrown to the front of his processor, of the looks they'd shared when he'd asked to go home that first time. They'd known. The whole time, they could have sent him back, but they lied and told him they couldn't. If they lied about that, what else could they have lied about? How much of what they had told him about this world was totally false?

He blinked, the hazy confusion in his processor being quickly replaced with fury, clear and sharp and biting. He tuned into the conversation he knew he wasn’t meant to hear again.

"You have to just come out with it," his counterpart was saying. "Tell him the truth before--"

His optics met Starscream's.

And his expression twisted into a grimace.

"Before he overhears something he shouldn't," the other Starscream said, his voice tight. "How long have you been standing there?"

Wheeljack whipped around, optics going wide and audial fins flicking through several different colors as he spotted Starscream where the Seeker was hidden behind the door. "Oh, scrap."

" _ Oh scrap _ indeed," Starscream hissed, stepping forward with his digits curled into claws. "How long were you intending to keep me in the dark? How long were you content to just let me laze about here, completely ignorant of what was really going on? Were you just going to-- to keep me? Like some kind of exotic pet?” He bared his teeth, wings flaring wide. “You will send me back, and you will send me back  _ now.” _

“Starscream--”

He cut off Wheeljack by raising his still-transformed blaster and pointing it at the scientist’s face. 

The other Starscream jumped to his pedes, probably about to try and defend his conjunx (like the soft, peace-broken slaghead that he was), but Wheeljack raised a servo to wave him off. He didn’t break optic contact with Starscream.

“Okay,” he said instead, quiet and all calm neutrality. “I’ll call a transport, and we’ll go to the lab.”

He did have to put his rifle away, mostly because the other Starscream kept leering at him and they were getting on a public transport (well, technically private, but there was a driver who would probably have frowned upon him holding a notable figure at gunpoint), but he made sure they could both still see his claws and how the light glinted off the sharpened edges. Safe place or not, he hadn’t been about to let his personal maintenance routine fall by the wayside.

Once they got to the tower the walk to Wheeljack’s lab was silent, tense, though uninterrupted thanks to the late hour. Thankfully, the scientist wasted no time, and within half an hour of their arrival (all of it which Starscream’s counterpart spent glaring holes in his wings from his position near the door) he’d set up his little contraption, and there was a swirling blue portal that looked remarkably like a groundbridge glowing in the corner of the lab.

“It aligns with your atoms as you walk through,” Wheeljack said quietly, “so it’ll take you back to wherever you last were before you arrived.” He paused, hesitated, then reached into his subspace and held something out. 

  
Starscream lurched back on instinct, one arm moving to cover his face.

When the object didn’t instantly explode, he cautiously lowered his arm, hesitating before moving closer to peer at the object. “What is it?”

“A communication beacon,” Wheeljack held it out a little further, clearly offering it to him. “If you ever need to contact us, for any reason. This’ll offer a direct link. Or if… you want to come back. It’ll let us track your location and open a portal to where you are. But-- only if you activate it,” he quickly added, as soon as Starscream started squinting suspiciously, “until you hit the button it’s just a useless hunk of metal.” 

Before he could overthink it too much, he swiped the beacon and deposited it in his subspace, swearing he wouldn’t use it no matter how desperate he got. 

“Oh, for-- here.” His counterpart finally approached, rolling his optics as he dumped several servofuls of energon cubes (where did he get them from??) into Starscream’s arms. Who instantly moved to catch them all and shove them into his subspace along with the beacon. “Take those. Don’t be an idiot.” He leaned down to stare Starscream in the optics. “We’re  _ both _ better than that,” he hissed. “I know what you’re planning on doing. And I am telling you now;  _ it’s not worth it. _ Don’t go back.”

Starscream stared at him. Then he bared his teeth. “You don’t know a single thing about me,” he said. 

Without another word, he turned and walked through the portal.

It briefly occurred to him, only after he was surrounded by swirling blue, that maybe he should have asked more about how it worked before just blindly walking into it.

Oh well. Too late now.

Thankfully the portal didn’t tear his atoms to shreds or destroy spacetime, simply spat him out in the forested clearing he’d been in when he first found the artifact that had sent him to the other universe in the first place. Said artifact was lying innocuously on the ground, surrounded by scuffed pedesteps in the dirt and some scorch marks surrounding it. 

Making sure he was far enough away that any backlash would hopefully not reach him, Starscream transformed his servo into a blaster and fired at the artifact until it exploded in a shower of multicolored sparks.

There. Out of sight, out of mind.

Pulling his plating close, he settled into the familiar confines of his alt-mode, and with a burst from his thrusters (that hopefully fried whatever was left of that accursed artifact) he soared off into the overcast sky.

-

...It was a bad idea. He knew it was a bad idea. He knew the smarter options would be to just go back to the  _ Harbinger, _ or seek out the Autobots (gag), or better yet leave Earth as a whole and find his own path. Those would all be better ideas than the one brewing at the forefront of his processor.

But, then again, he’d thought trusting an alternate version of himself and his idiot genius of a conjunx would be a smart idea, too. He shouldn’t have been surprised, really. No matter what universe, a Starscream was still a Starscream, and thus would inevitably betray everyone near them. Anyone who, for a moment, made the mistake of trusting them. Any fool who was stupid enough not to know better. Like Starscream himself.

What the Pit was he  _ thinking. _

He’d known it was too good to be true from the moment he’d onlined his optics there. It had all stuck out as fundamentally wrong. And now he knew why.

Because it  _ was _ wrong. It was all complete and utter (to borrow a human phrase)  _ bullshit. _

Now he knew what it felt like to be on the other end of a betrayal. And, to be honest, it felt like slag. There was a sickening feeling in his tanks, a physical ache in his struts. He was completely out of his element. He was alone, unsettled, with an uncertain future and a stunning lack of available processing power to put towards critical thinking. So of course he did what he  _ always _ did when he found himself without a solid foothold in anything and no clear place in the world.

He turned to Megatron.

Finding the  _ Nemesis _ wasn’t hard. Technically, he still had programs needed to find the ship even when it was cloaked. His access codes had no doubt been changed after his departure, so there was a semi-decent chance they might just shoot him down on approach, but  _ maybe _ he could at least get close enough to hail them on a local line and explain his position. 

Explain that he had several cubes of well-refined energon in his subspace, and a functional t-cog, and he was willing to serve.

He ignored the shiver that ran across his wings.

Megatron would let him back. He always did. This wasn’t even the longest amount of time he’d spent away from the Decepticons since joining them. It had barely been more than a few months. Not even close to those hundred years near the middle where he’d been briefly disillusioned with the idea of war as a whole and spent roughly a century scrounging for resources on some abandoned planetoid, nearly dying, and dragging himself back to Megatron’s pedes. The resulting punishment had been one of the worst he had remaining memories of, but… he’d still been allowed back.

And he’d be allowed back now. He was sure of it. They weren’t even shooting at him as he pulled up and over the hull of the ship. He flew until he was just above the landing pad, then transformed and dropped to land in a rather graceful crouch, if he did say so himself. The pad was empty, but as he approached the doors that led to the ship’s interior, several vehicons stepped out with blasters raised.

“At ease!” He called, raising his servos to show he was unarmed. “I… would like to speak to M-- Lord Megatron.”

The vehicons glanced at each other. Then shrugged, transforming their blasters away and gesturing for him to follow. So either they didn’t have orders to kill him on sight, or Megatron had redacted them once he’d seen Starscream approaching.

...Either would be fine options. 

The third option was that Megatron had redacted it because he wanted to offline Starscream himself which would not be very fine at all.

But time would tell.

The vehicons led him through the familiar dim halls of the ship. He could have found his own way, but antagonizing the drones would probably not be the best idea right about now. Not when his own standing was no doubt tentative at best. It was doubtful Megatron would restore his former position (either of them), there was a much better chance he’d be treated like one of said drones until he did something flashy that regained Megatron’s attention. 

With an ominous hiss, the doors to the bridge slid open, revealing Megatron standing and facing the window, silhouetted by the dim lighting of the night sky outside. When Starscream and his vehicon escorts entered, he didn’t even glance back. Just raised one clawed servo and spoke; “Leave us.”

As a single unit, the vehicons departed, and the doors closed behind them with a sense of finality, leaving Starscream alone with Megatron.

Great.

He opened his vents to try and get clear air to help himself focus and not get lost in reminders of being here, once more at the warlord’s mercy, but the only air he was able to draw in was the stale and recycled kind that the ship always had. So instead he shook his head and cleared his vocalizer, standing up tall. “My Lord,” he said.

“Starscream,” Megatron said.

Starscream stifled his wince. He disguised the movement in stepping forward, heels clicking on the floor. Once he was near enough to see the reflection of Megatron’s optics (red, thank Primus, at least he wouldn’t have to deal with a Dark Energon-enhanced Megatron on top of a very angry one), he stopped and knelt. Firmly ignored the ill feeling that settled in his spark at the motion. “I humbly ask your forgiveness,” he said, willing his voice to only waver in that carefully calculated way that usually amused Megatron into going along with what he was saying, “and request that I be allowed to rejoin the Decepticon ranks, to serve you.”

Silence. Then Megatron turned, peering down at him with narrowed optics. “Ask? Request?” A series of disappointed clicks from his vocalizer. “My my, Starscream, how quickly you’ve forgotten your place.” In an instant, there was the pointed end of Megatron’s sword pointed at the cables of his throat. He froze.  _ Scrap. _ “Must I remind you? Or will you remember on your own?”

What had he said wrong, what had he-- Oh. “My-- My deepest apologies, Master,” he said, hating the way the word tasted as it left his mouth, “That is, I-- I beg you. Please.” His tanks rolled. “Please let me come back.”

Megatron laughed, loud and hoarse and cruel (and nothing like Wheeljack’s good-natured chuckle), and the blade pressing against his neck retracted. “I noticed you managed to reacquire your transformation cog,” he mused. “Is a mech with all the functionality of a drone all you have to offer me? I have no need for any more sparkless imbeciles among my ranks.”

“No, Master,” he reached into his subspace and-- carefully avoiding the communication beacon that seemed to grow heavier the longer he spent in this horribly tense environment-- pulled out the collection of energon cubes that his counterpart had shoved into his servos before sending him off.  _ Don’t go back, _ he’d said. Too late. “It may be of an odd appearance, but I swear to you, it is energon. High-quality as well. And-- and I offer it to you.”

A low hum. Starscream held up the cubes, and Megatron plucked one from the pile, cracking it open and taking a single sip of the contents. Not enough to debilitate him, had the cubes happened to be poisoned, but enough for him to be able to analyze it and make sure it wasn’t.

“That  _ is _ rather high quality,” he muttered. Then leaned down slightly. “And you appear to be in fine health. Tell me; where  _ have _ you been spending your time since you abandoned us?”

Starscream’s spark skipped a beat. He couldn’t tell him. Not that he was worried for the safety of the other world (he was), but he feared what might happen if Megatron knew. If he learned there was another Cybertron out there, one with no shortage of fuel and a society that had only known peace for a brief time yet was already forgetting what it was like to be at was, he would do anything to find it and make it his own. And since Starscream was the only one who knew of its existence… Megatron would do anything to get as many details from him as possible.

“I found-- an abandoned Autobot refuge,” he hazarded. “Long abandoned, it had likely not seen use in many years. Left behind was this strange fuel, as well as a-- several medicinal supplies that I used to… repair my frame. I hid there.”

“Oh?” Megatron gave him a skeptical look. “And where  _ is _ this Autobot refuge?”

“Far from here,” he said instantly. “I-- I left the planet. My signal likely disappeared for a while. I don’t… remember how to get there.”

“I’m sure.” He totally didn’t believe him. But he didn’t call his bluff, or demand the truth, just peered down at where Starscream knelt on the floor, servos trembling where they held the pile of energon cubes. He crossed his arms.

And a moment later the door to the bridge slid open. Starscream didn’t dare look over.

“You wanted to see me, my Lord?” Who was--

“Ah, Dreadwing,” Megatron said, and there was an indignant flare of anger in his chassis.  _ Dreadwing _ was his replacement?? That hack excuse for a Seeker? Dreadwing was an idiot, always thinking with his  _ honor _ instead of his head, and-- 

Oh dear. And Starscream had mutilated his twin’s corpse by turning it into a walking corpse.

He risked glancing away from Megatron and at who had just entered. Sure enough, there stood Dreadwing in all his disgustingly noble royal blue plating, followed by a vehicon trotting after him. The other Seeker caught sight of Starscream kneeling on the floor and frowned. “What did you call me here for?”

Megatron gestured at the Vehicon, who instantly came forward to take the cubes from Starscream, leaving him free to rest his servos on his legs instead. “Our errant Air Commander has returned to us,” he said, reaching down to grip Starscream by one wing and haul him to his pedes. Starscream bit down to stifle the yelp at the cruel gesture. He’d… almost forgotten. Gotten used to not being in pain. (He’d have to get used to it again pretty fast.) “And he requires a reintroduction with the functions of this ship.” The warlord looked to him. “From now on, you report to Dreadwing. Am I clear?”

Completely against his will, his wings hiked up indignantly, and he bared his teeth. “M--”

“Am I  _ clear?” _ Megatron hissed, stepping closer, fury clear enough in the bright glow of his optics. Starscream quietly cursed himself. He’d been back for barely five minutes and he was already falling back into old habits.

He let his wings fall low, bowing his head and shoving his resentment down. “Yes, Master,” he said, trying not to spit the words. 

“Good.”

With that Megatron turned away from him, leaving him to hurry after Dreadwing when the larger Seeker gave him a scowl and gestured for him to follow. 

Welcome home, Starscream.

-

He supposed it was foolish to think that, perhaps, this time would be better. That anything would have changed between when he left and getting back. That Megatron might have had… what, a change of spark? Suddenly realized how abhorrent his actions were and vowed to do better? Ha! Hardly. Perhaps he really had spent too much time in that other world, where things seemed so good. He’d gotten into a peaceful mindset and look where it had gotten him.

Right back where he started.

Whatever hope he was holding onto that maybe things wouldn’t be as bad were dashed the instant Megatron called him to the bridge again several days later, right as he’d been getting ready to recharge. (At least Megatron hadn’t given away his room along with his rank.) With his wings kept low and close to his back, he slunk more than walked onto the bridge.

It was, like it had been during his return, empty save for himself and Megatron, though he did not doubt that Laserbeak was hidden somewhere in the rafters. Recording everything.

Sneaky little thing that she was.

He knew what this was to be about. He knew why he’d been called here. And as much as he should have been bracing himself, reminding himself that this was how it went, steeling his nerves for what was to come, he couldn’t. The old grim acceptance he’d gotten used to wouldn’t come to him, and the only thing he felt at that moment was a sickening sense of dismay low in his tanks.

“I presume you know why you’re here?” was what Megatron opened with, and Starscream’s wings sunk even lower.

  
“I do,” he said.

Though he couldn’t see the warlord’s face with how his head was bowed, he could hear the twisted grin in Megatron’s voice. “Then you can make this easier on yourself.” He stepped forward, pedesteps echoing ominously around the empty bridge. “Kneel.” 

Even as a voice that sounded suspiciously like his alternate universe counterpart screeched furiously in his helm for him to refuse, he complied. Carefully, as not to make things worse before they even began, he lowered himself to his knees and bowed his head. Braced his servos on his legs. 

“And what do you have to say for yourself?”

He reset his vocalizer when it refused to cooperate. “I am sorry, Master,” he said. “Please, forgive me.”

A shadow fell over him as Megatron stepped even closer, and a moment later there was the firm press of a pede on his helm. He went with the motion, but that didn’t stop the pain when his helm hit the floor. He stifled a wince. Reacting at all would be a show of weakness. “You don’t even know what you’re apologizing for. It’s just in your nature to grovel. Pathetic,” Megatron hissed, pressing his heel down further against the Seeker’s helm so it ground Starscream’s face against the floor.

_ Pathetic, _ his own mind whispered back at him.

Briefly, as Megatron stepped away and hauled him up by the throat, his thoughts flashed to the communication beacon sitting dormant in his subspace. It would be so easy to just reach in, press the button, and not have to deal with any of this mess any further.

But-- no. He wouldn’t. He  _ couldn’t. _ Not after they’d betrayed him, lied to him like that. The beacon probably didn’t even work. It was probably just one last ditch effort to humiliate him, watch him call for help then laugh when he felt betrayed all over again when it didn’t work. No, it was better if he just stayed. As painful as it was (as Megatron tossed him aside, his wings slamming into one of the consoles along the wall) at least it was familiar. This was a known quantity, and even if he was injured, he was also in his depth. 

The other universe had been nice, but Starscream hadn’t known how to act at  _ all. _ It seemed like every instinctual reaction he’d had was the wrong one. The war was done there. But Starscream had come from a world where he was still right in the thick of it. He was out of place, there. Even if he had a good time, he never could have found a real place there.

“What’s this?” Megatron muttered, interrupting his internal musing. He re-focused on the present, wincing as pain settled into his struts.

The warlord was standing there, holding Starscream up by his wrist, and the thing that prompted Megatron’s query was the thin band of metal firmly secured around it. Starscream’s spark skipped another beat. “It’s nothing,” he said quickly, hoping the warlord would just leave it alone. He’d given away the energon, he couldn’t trust the communicator, and besides the single datapad he’d carefully tucked away in his room as soon as he’d gotten a chance, it was the last reminder he had of the other world. Of the peaceful time he’d had before the whole betrayal thing. (Although, technically they’d been hiding the truth the whole time, so… had it always been a betrayal?) “Just a… trinket.” 

“A  _ trinket,” _ Megatron repeated, and Starscream realized too late he’d said the wrong thing. “I didn’t realize a soldier of your status had any need for  _ trinkets.”  _ He slipped one claw under the edge of the band, prying it off, and Starscream let slip the first sound he’d made since this all started. A quiet, pained sound as Megatron crushed the band under his pede. 

He tossed Starscream aside again, and the Seeker hit the floor and slid with the horrible sound of metal scraping against metal.

It didn’t hurt as much as seeing the tiny, insignificant piece of metal mangled as Megatron stepped away from it. But it was fine. He didn’t miss them. Not one bit.

“You’ve fallen far in your absence, Starscream,” Megatron said, stalking towards him. He only noticed he was shaking when he saw how jagged the lines his claws were scraping into the floor were. “Wherever you were, because I don’t believe your story of an ‘abandoned Autobot refuge’ for a single  _ second,  _ they were far too  _ kind _ to you.” He stepped on one of Starscream’s wings, and grabbed the other and sunk his claws in when it fluttered involuntarily. “Kindness doesn’t suit you. You’re the kind of mech who needs  _ control, _ lest you grow even weaker than you already are.” 

“I don’t--” He choked out, vocalizer giving up midway through whatever he’d been about to say.

“What was that?” Megatron snarled, grabbing his arm and hauling him up to optic level. “Is there something you’d like to say, Starscream?”

A lot of things, come to think of it.  _ Get slagged _ was probably number one on his list.  _ I hope you rot _ fell close at number two. The list went on and on. He had a lot of things he’d been wanting to say (in general and to Megatron specifically) but had refrained from doing so for  _ years. _

But currently, there was one thing on his mind.

“I don’t have to take this,” he rasped.

Megatron let go, and Starscream landed on the floor in a heap. Apparently him having the gall to stand up for himself for once in his Primus-damned life had actually managed to catch the warlord off guard. For once.

“You--”

“I don’t have to take this,” he repeated, slightly louder. This was a bad idea. Like, worse than his “going back to the  _ Nemesis” _ idea. This was quite possibly the worst idea he’d ever had. But slaggit, he was tired of this. He was tired of getting hurt. He’d finally had a place where he could just live in peace without having to fight for his life or his next ration, where he could stop jumping at shadows and dreading every call of his name out of fear for what it might bring with it. And then he’d gone and  _ thrown it all away _ because, what, they’d lied to him to get him to stay longer? If anything he should’ve been  _ flattered _ that they were willing to do so.

Wheeljack and the other Starscream actually wanted him around. They enjoyed his company. They were  _ nice _ to him simply because they felt like it. They gave him fuel, and a place to stay (a  _ home) _ and they didn’t expect anything in return. And he’d abandoned all of that because… what, they kept a secret from him? As if he hadn’t done the same?

It had seemed like such a big deal in the moment. He trusted them and they lied. The worst kind of offense, especially for a mech like Starscream, who did not trust easily.

But now, literally back under Megatron’s pede, wings bleeding and struts aching, he realized how inconsequential it all was. So what, they lied. Big fragging deal. He did that all the time. On a daily basis. Pit, he was lying to himself right now!!

...He was?

Well, at the very least, he had been earlier.

He missed the other world  _ so much. _

Megatron wrapped a clawed servo around his throat, hauling him up. “You’ve certainly gotten  _ mouthy,” _ he said. “Whoever you spent your time with clearly failed to discipline you properly.”

Baring his teeth, Starscream finally  _ (finally) _ managed to get the jump on Megatron  _ (for once) _ as he swung his legs up, jamming the points of his heels against Megatron’s faceplate. There was a series of sparks, the awful sound of glass shattering and several fuses blowing simultaneously, and Megatron gave a pained shout and dropped Starscream in favor of clutching at his optics. 

Starscream landed on his aft, immediately backpedaling away from the warlord so he could grab the communicator from his subspace. Wheeljack had made it blessedly simple, there were two whole buttons on it; a red and green one. Which… well, okay, he didn’t label them, so it could have been  _ simpler, _ but at least he didn’t have to type any numbers or anything.

Unsure of which was the right one to press, he simply jammed his digit over both buttons one after the other, just in time for Megatron to recover enough to go back on the offensive. 

Given the fact that there were two dark sockets where his optics should’ve been, leaking energon with bits of broken glass around the edges, he  _ ought to _ have had a harder time. But what good would a gladiator be if the loss of one sense immediately disabled them? Starscream hadn’t been expecting him to fumble around blindly, but he had also not been expecting the accuracy with which Megatron grabbed his ankle and hauled him over. The communicator fell from his servos and landed on the floor with a clatter, and he was dragged away just as he heard the concerned call of  _ “Starscream?” _

“I’ll kill you for that, you little wretch!” Megatron near-roared, grabbing at both of Starscream’s arms and squeezing until the metal gave and crumpled under his servos. Starscream hissed, once more attempting to raise his legs and kick at the warlord, but that trick was not about to work twice. Megatron simply grabbed his leg with one servo and used it to fling him against the wall. He made contact against his already injured wings and there was a blat of static from his vocalizer. 

Megatron advanced on him, a grisly sight with his optics gone, and the purple backlighting from the rest of the bridge casting ominous shadows over his frame. His teeth were bared in a snarl.

“I have let you continue to cross and combat me for  _ far _ too long,” he hissed. “You have already lived beyond your intended lifespan. It is time I corrected a grievous error on my part-- allowing you to  _ live.” _ He aimed his cannon at Starscream’s head. The Seeker braced himself.

And then… nothing.

Not nothing in a “the great, endless darkness that existed beyond the realm of the living,” but nothing as in  _ nothing happened. _ As in, Megatron had a fusion cannon pointed at him and didn’t. Fire. After giving such an eloquent final recitation, too. After a few more moments of curling in on himself and squeezing his optics shut to avoid having to see his own death approaching, he risked a peek at the room.

Megatron’s cannon had listed off to the side, and he was instead staring in the general direction of a swirling blue portal that had opened a few paces away. Starscream was pretty sure he couldn’t actually  _ see _ it, since proximity sensors really only worked on mechs, but evidently the thing’s EM readout was enough to garner his attention.

Starscream tried taking advantage of his momentary distraction to slip away, but the sound of one of his injured wings scraping against the ground made the warlord look at him again.

“As I said,” Megatron raised his cannon, “this ends--”

He wasn’t sure if it was the universe trying to make up for all the slag it put him through, or if he’d just gotten lucky, or if this was one last hurrah before it decided to  _ really _ put him through the wringer, but there was a spectacular amount of things interrupting Starscream’s more-than-certain death today.

This time the interruption came in the form of a red and black pede roundhouse kicking Megatron in the head. 

The warlord didn’t see it coming, and thus had no time to defend himself, so it hit him dead-on and he went down like a sack of bricks, being flung to the side and skidding against the floor, finally landing in a heap of shiny silver metal a couple meters away. He wasn’t dead, unfortunately, there was still the faint movement of his chest that signified a beating spark, but there was a very slim chance he’d be back on his pedes any time soon.

Starscream looked up.

It was probably a little conceited to say such things about a mech who was technically just him-but-not, but in that moment, haloed by the soft blue glow of the portal and standing tall above him with his wings spread wide, the Starscream from the other universe looked a bit like one of those holy saviors the old books would always talk about.

“I told you going back wasn’t worth it,” his counterpart grumbled. “Though as annoying as it was having to take the time out of my day to come get you, I  _ did _ appreciate the chance to land a solid hit like that on any version of the bucket-head.” 

Curled up and bleeding on the floor, Starscream hunched his shoulders and burst out laughing.

“Hah, bucket-head,” he said, laughter interspersed with barely-repressed sniffles. “That’s funny.”

His counterpart gave him a look that was halfway between pity and remorse, crouching before him and gently resting a servo on his cheek. He couldn’t even find it in himself to be mad at the expression. “What in the Pit did he do to you..?” His counterpart murmured, tilting his helm to the side. “You look like a mess.”

“I feel like a mess,” Starscream said honestly. The scrapes on his face stung, and he very firmly told himself it wasn’t because he’d started crying.

The deepening of his counterpart’s frown and the gentle brush of digits just under his optics told him that, uh, yeah, it was definitely because he’d just started crying. Ah, whatever, it wasn’t like he could fall much farther at this point. He gave up trying to hold on to any pretense of dignity and instead promptly started sobbing, wings shuddering and vents heaving. His counterpart, gracefully, said nothing. Just pulled him close and let him cry against his shoulder.

“It’s alright,” he said. “You’re safe now.”

Ignoring the pain in his arms from where his plating had been crushed, Starscream reached up to cling to the other mech. At this point the fact that this was technically another version of himself was the furthest thing from his mind. They were far too fundamentally  _ different, _ especially now, for him to see much of himself.

His counterpart stood, hefting him up as he went, and headed back towards the portal. “Unfortunately Ratchet has already left, but Flatline is a capable medic when he needs to be, and both Wheeljack and myself are not incapable. We haven’t touched your room, everything is right where you left it. I had a hunch you would--” He cut off, staring at something on the floor. Lifting his face from where it was shoved in the crook of the other mech’s neck, Starscream scrubbed at his optics to clear his vision and peered down to see what had caught his attention.

Oh.

The “anti-paradox” band.

He’d… kind of forgotten about it.

“Well,” the other Starscream said quietly, “it appears Wheeljack was wrong.”

His addled processor took a moment to catch up, but once it did, Starscream momentarily felt even more dizzy. He’d forgotten. He’d lost it, but then the other Starscream had come through and made contact with him even though he wasn’t wearing it. They completely could’ve destroyed the universe, all because he forgot Megatron broke his bracelet.

Laughter burst from his chassis before he could stop it, and his counterpart just gave him a mildly concerned look as he carried him through the portal.

He must have lost consciousness sometime between them entering the portal and leaving it, because the next time Starscream opened his optics was not-- as he had expected-- seconds after he’d closed them having just been brought through the portal. Instead, he woke up in a significant lack of pain, surrounded by soft things with his face buried in a pillow. Once control of his limbs returned he shoved himself up, taking stock of his surroundings.

It was… his room. Not his room on the  _ Nemesis, _ but the one in Wheeljack and the other Starscream’s apartment. In the other world.

He’d actually made it back.

The relief he felt at the realization was palpable, and he would’ve definitely just gone right back to sleep if he didn’t hear quiet movement outside the door. Shoving aside the blankets and such still covering his frame (his… remarkably undamaged seeming frame, actually), he stumbled to his pedes, trudging to the door and carefully sliding it open.

And was promptly met with a startled looking Wheeljack standing across from him.

“Oh,” he said, “you’re up. I was just coming to check on you.” He gestured with the softly glowing cube in his servo, past Starscream and further into his room. “Brought you some fuel. Mind if we sit?”

Silently, Starscream stepped aside to allow him in. He took a seat on the edge of Starscream’s berth and held out the cube.

After a moment of deliberation, Starscream took it, sipping at it slowly. “So if I hadn’t woken up,” he said, out of a desire to make conversation more than any genuine curiosity, “how were you planning on giving me fuel without an intraline?” Or… had he been planning an intraline? There wasn’t really anything in here that would indicate that to be an easy set-up.

Wheeljack gave him a skeptical look, tilting his head as though emphasizing the mask across his face. “You think I don’t know how to fuel a mech without a functional intake?” 

...Oh. Of course he knew how. “Ah,” Starscream said, fans clicking on the lowest setting. “Right… Sorry.”   
  


“It’s fine. I’m not offended.” 

They lapsed back into silence until Starscream spoke up again; “So, we uh… discovered that… turns out the universe will  _ not _ spontaneously collapse if the same mechs from two different worlds make contact.” He reset his vocalizer with a click. “...So that’s good to know.”

“Yeah, Star mentioned.” Wheeljack narrowed his optics. “That was one hell of a way to test that theory.”

“Well, it wasn’t like we could’ve gotten a controlled environment.”

A raspy laugh. “You’re not wrong.” Wheeljack stared at him, then sighed. “Look, Starscream,” he began, and something heavy settled in Starscream’s tanks.

He very pointedly looked away, staring at the floor and letting his wings fall. He should’ve known this was coming. After turning on them like he had-- even as nice as they were, of course there would be some kind of chastisement at the very least. Perhaps they’d kick him out, make him learn to survive in this world on his own. Or do the opposite, lock him up and not let him out until he apologized for acting so rashly or jumping to conclusions or… whatever. He wasn’t sure  _ what _ exactly his comeuppance would be, but whatever it was, he knew he probably deserved worse. 

“Just don’t send me back,” he sputtered before he could get a solid clamp on his vocalizer, digits curling around the empty cube he held with enough force to crack the glass. “You can do anything you’d like, I won’t complain, just-- anything but that.  _ Please _ don’t make me go back there.”

Wheeljack was silent, and when Starscream risked a glance up at him, the scientist was looking at him with some kind of bewildered concern. “What?”

“I-- I know it was, ah, rude of me. You were so nice to me and then I turned on you the instant I thought you might have been… untruthful.” He set the cube down, fidgeting with his own digits instead. “I understand that a punishment of-- of some kind is in order. And I will endure such discipline with grace. But please, I beg of you, don’t make me go back to that--”

“Starscream,  _ what _ are you talking about??” 

He fell silent. It… Could’ve been a ploy. An attempt to get him to lower his guard. But, well, Wheeljack was really  _ bad _ at lying, he’d said so himself, and he looked like he had genuinely no idea what Starscream was referring to.

“You… are not going to punish me? For acting out?”

Wheeljack stared at him for a moment longer. Then his optics softened. “Oh, Starscream, no. No, ‘course we aren’t.” He reached over, gently taking Starscream’s servos in his own. “No, and you’re never gonna be punished like  _ that _ for anything. Never again. Even if you, like, kill a mech or somethin’, you’ll have a fair trial and a right to a representative and all that. We aren’t gonna hurt you for being a little ornery or slipping up once in a while.” He tilted his head up to meet Starscream’s optics. “Starscream, I was gonna apologize to you.”

Starscream blinked. Reset his audials, and played the recorded file back again just to make sure he’d actually heard it correctly. “You…” Ugh. He hated how pitiful his voice sounded. And yet, he couldn’t have made it less so if he tried. “You were… what?”

A resolute nod. “I’m sorry, Starscream. We shouldn’t have lied to you. It was wrong. Yeah, we did so with your best interests in mind, but that doesn’t excuse you. We should’a told you the truth from the beginning and let you make your own choice as to whether or not you wanted to give this place a shot.” He moved both of Starscream’s servos to one of his, and reached over with his free one to gently set it against Starscream’s chest. “The blame’s on us with that one. An’ I’m sorry.”

“...Oh,” Starscream muttered. “Well. It’s… fine.” What was a mech supposed to say in this situation?? “I… forgive you?”

Another few moments of staring. Then Wheeljack shook his head, laughing softly. “It’s a start.”

So, if he wasn’t going to be punished… “...What’s going to happen to me now?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well,” he pulled his servos free of Wheeljack’s so he could go back to fidgeting with them. “I presume I can’t just… stay here and not contribute forever. While most of my skills are more suited to a war environment, I’m sure I could find a use for some of them in a peacetime--”

“Why can’t you?” Wheeljack interrupted him, and he briefly stalled.

“Sorry, what?”

“I mean, why can’t you just stay here and not contribute forever?” The scientist shrugged. “Me and Star got more shanix than either of us really need, ‘specially now that I’ve convinced him to stop buying so much useless pretty scrap. I’m head of sciences and he’s  _ the guy in charge, _ if you don’t wanna do anything, ain’t a spark out there who can make you.” He gestured at the general area. “We’ll get you more comfortable leaving on your own, a’course, wouldn’t want you getting all cooped up and such. Make sure you can stretch your wings whenever you want. Maybe get you introduced to a few of our friends.” Wheeljack seemed to notice his stunned silence, because he trailed off. “...You okay?”

“I…” He looked down at his servos. They were… shaking slightly. Fascinating. “I don’t… know. I don’t think so.”

“...Anything I can do to help?”

There he went again, just being nice because he wanted to or whatever. Starscream wasn’t sure he’d ever quite get used to that part. But… maybe with a little time, he could get used to everything else.

After millions of years at war,  _ peace _ was starting to sound pretty good to his audials. 

“I don’t think so,” Starscream said. “I think this is something I need to figure out on my own. But… I appreciate the offer.” 

Wheeljack’s optics scrunched up in a smile. “Of course. If you do decide you want help, the both of us are happy to lend a servo where it’s needed.” He reached over, resting a servo on Starscream’s arm. “And hey, Starscream?”

He looked over at the scientist.

“Welcome home.”

**Author's Note:**

> i didnt wanna put ptsd in the tags cause i dont know enough about it and therefore dont want to treat my writing as an accurate depiction of it, but in my humble neurodivergent opinion tfp screamer has DEFINITELY got some of that rattling around in his skull along with all his other issues
> 
> megatron is a little bitch ✨✨
> 
> if i see a single selfcest comment im going to start throwing rocks at people


End file.
